Her tattoos already reveal a lot about Vaniessa Rashid. For example, a compass is depicted on her left upper arm. It stands for “getting out of national thinking,” says Rashid. Right next to it: the outlines of Kurdistan, a place of longing for Kurdin Rashid. Away from nationality or towards it? How does that fit together? “You can be patriotic without being nationalistic,” says Rashid. The answer comes so quickly and confidently that there is no room for eventualities. That probably explains the arrow that runs through both tattoos. The 30-year-old explains that it means things are going straight, straight ahead.
The Green politician from the east of Munich looks aggressive when she comes to the café for lunch in high heels. Another organization call, shortly before the next election campaign event, then she takes the time to formulate quick-witted answers to all questions.
So to the front. “Doing nothing is not an option,” it says on her right wrist, also as a tattoo, directly below the Munich skyline. She has already won the first political attack, even if she would never call it an attack: With her candidacy at the assembly of the Greens in Munich-East in the spring, she pushed the experienced politician and her own political foster mother Margarete Bause from the throne. Rashid prefers to refer to this process quite diplomatically as an “offer”. She just made her party friends a better one – and was nominated with one vote more as a direct candidate for the Greens for the east of Munich. Now her face adorns the election posters. It shows a young, energetic woman with long black hair and a big smile.
The next attack is already being carefully planned: The aim is to convince the majority of voters in the east of the city to cast their first vote for Rashid’s name this time – and not, as traditionally since 1976, for the CSU candidate. The last two times won Wolfgang Stefinger, who is already a member of the Bundestag for the Christian Socialists. That doesn’t deter Vaniessa Rashid, on the contrary, you get the feeling that she really wants to compete. You, a newcomer? She just shrugs her shoulders. At least not in the political field, since she has been committed to women’s and minority rights for as long as she could remember. In addition, with the green upswing, you now have “a historic opportunity,” she says.
And: With her as a candidate, the Greens would have the best cards anyway, they could help to mobilize the migrants in the districts in the east of Munich. As a refugee and Kurd, she wants to increase the proportion of migrants in the Bundestag, which is much too low compared to the population. So it means to go from café to lottery shop to greengrocer and to animate the electorate. “People, don’t throw away the election letter, take the chance,” she tells people.
One of your key moments? Certainly Munich Central Station in September 2015. Back then, she was one of the first to organize the aid structures on site, completely spontaneously. Another was certainly her own escape: Vaniessa Rashid was three years old when she fled northern Iraq with her parents and her little sister in 1994. The long escape route ended years later in Munich. The mother became ill, the father became violent. At 13, she reported him after he kicked the door and pulled the mother off the bed shortly after an operation. A life in relative poverty follows, with a single mother on Hartz IV and standing in line at the table. “I know what it is like when you feel embarrassed in front of your friends,” she says. But the mother gets up, fights for her rights and founds a Kurdish women’s group. Tackling, she learned from her “great, active mom”, says Rashid today.
That’s why she definitely wants to tackle the issue of child poverty in Berlin. And finally anchoring children’s rights in the Basic Law, says Rashid. Immediately afterwards she wants to campaign for “a sensible immigration law”. In any case, if it has its way, migration should be seen as an asset.
Rashid lives in Ramersdorf-Perlach. The district has the second highest proportion of Munich residents with a migration background. Here she has been involved in the district committee for years and is well connected as an integration officer and activist for women’s rights. The basis, she emphasizes again and again, is extremely important to her. She feels inspired by her, she wants to go to Berlin for her: “Basis is boss.”
In the past, she really didn’t want to go to a party at all. “As an activist, I wanted to change the whole world and not be thwarted by any party barriers,” she recalls. Then, after graduating from high school, she did an internship with the Greens in the Bavarian state parliament – in Margarete Bause’s office. There she felt: “Here you can make a difference.” She was enthusiastic about the energy of the MPs, about the will to fight for a better world. And she felt that she was being taken seriously as an intern. That is why she joined the Greens and not, like her mother, the SPD. Although her daughter, social policy is also important.
The 30-year-old is studying political science and law at the LMU and earns something with student contracts, for example in a law firm. The election campaign is currently taking up a lot of time. If you don’t focus on the climate or the LGBTI community, you’re a bird of paradise with the Greens, says Rashid. But for her, the migrants are the heart of the matter – and she wants to win with them.